The Most Powerful Women in Finance, No. 24, Christina Minnis, Goldman Sachs

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Christina Minnis is addressing one of the most important trends taking place in finance today: the emergence and growth of private credit as a powerful tool for clients.

Earlier this year, Christina Minnis was named the first Global Head of Credit & Asset Finance and head of Global Acquisition Finance within the newly created Capital Solutions Group at Goldman Sachs . Her unit is responsible for a significant portion of the new group's business. "I'm most proud of having been asked to lead that effort, working with many of my partners to execute the mission that David [Solomon, CEO] and John [Waldron, president and COO] laid out," she said.

"That mission is to bring together the best structuring capabilities of the firm with the best distribution capabilities in order to create global, very bespoke solutions to our clients on the issuing side. And, on the investing side, to continue to have a very strong relationship and sourcing engine for our asset and wealth management division, " she explained.

Cade Thompson, a former colleague and now global co-head of KKR debt capital markets & U.S. co-head of KKR credit solutions group, has known Minnis for more than 20 years and said her ability to bring Goldman's capabilities together has always been differentiating. "She doesn't just deliver a singular product. She doesn't just deliver credit. She delivers her entire firm. She connects the dots across geographies, across products, and ties the firm together into one cohesive package. The power of that is quite significant," Thompson said.

Minnis's talent has helped keep the firm's growth engines humming. Net revenues for Global Banks & Markets (GBM) were $34.94 billion for 2024, 16% higher than 2023. Investment banking fees were $7.73 billion, 24% higher than 2023, primarily reflecting significantly higher net revenue in debt underwriting. Meanwhile, within GBM net revenues for fixed income, currency and commodities (FICC) were $13.20 billion, 9% higher than 2023, reflecting higher net revenues in FICC financing of $3.64 billion. FICC financing revenues for the first quarter of 2025 were $1.01 billion, up 19% from the previous year.

Advances in private credit, especially to help finance the AI infrastructure build out and the energy transition globally, will be a big driver of growth, she said."Clients need to raise billions and billions of dollars, and many do not want to put that debt capital on the balance sheet and put pressure on the ratings. [Private credit] is a critical innovation to move that debt off the balance sheet."

Keeping an eye on the business also means keeping an eye on talent, so Minnis spends a lot of time mentoring, on career development and making sure people feel they have a good path forward at the firm. She's particularly interested in nurturing women and diverse talent "to make sure that they're thinking more expansively about the opportunity set as they think about their careers. This is an area that I get tremendous energy from."